AN overwhelming number of residents in Studley want the Green Belt around the village protected.
That’s the finding of the newly published parish plan which also calls for action to ‘pursue all methods’ of reducing traffic through the village, improve play facilities for children and increase police cover, as well as a host of other concerns.
In all some 98 per cent of people who responded to a parish survey rated the quality of the countryside around Studley as important to them, and although they recognised the need for more housing, residents were also absolutely clear they did not want to see the separation between the village and Redditch reduced.
“Keeping the separation from Redditch, maintaining the Green Belt and keeping our green open spaces that is the road we will go down whatever we want to do,” said parish chairman Councillor Paul Beaman.
However he recognised there was a conflict between people wanting more houses, jobs and a greater retail offering in the village and also preserving the Green Belt and those open spaces.
“There’s only three ways for us to go – building south from the Bromsgrove Road, but that’s in Sambourne and outside our jurisdiction, east from the A435 but that would be into parkland, or on the Redditch side but residents have said they don’t want anything that will take us closer to Redditch,” said Coun Beaman.
He added that the only way that remained viable was to use more sites within the village.
The Parish Plan, which is aimed at addressing the needs of the village and setting a strategy for organisations in Studley within the core strategy of Stratford district council, has been some five years in the making, a lengthy time largely due to problems Stratford had with its own plan.
Designed to take the village to 2021 Coun Beaman hopes it will then be superseded by a Neighbourhood Plan, a much more robust document that should lay down guidelines for Studley until at least 2026.
